Thank you to the 59 poets from Canada, Italy, Sweden, the United Kingdom, and across the United States who contributed their work to the Silver Birch Press Celebrity Free Verse Poetry Series, which ran from September 1-30, 2014.

NOTE FROM THE AUTHOR: This poem was created using snippets from an interview with Leonard Cohen from Rolling Stone, prior to the launch of his new album Popular Problems and his 80th birthday. I’d like to think of this poem as an homage to the mastery of Cohen and the mystery of poetry.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Greg Santos is the author of Rabbit Punch!(DC Books, 2014) and The Emperor’s Sofa (DC Books, 2010). He holds an MFA in Creative Writing from The New School. He is a graphic designer, teaches creative writing to at-risk youth, and is the poetry editor for carte blanche. He lives in Montréal with his wife and two children. Follow him on Twitter at @moondoggyspad.

I keep returning
to stoned wishes,
love staggering
among the buried,
tall poplars,
anemones’ dramatic
sway.
I’m interested
in turbulence,
paranoia, dissection
of fundamentalists
and wary fish.
Fallen into woe,
I long to loosen
the blue door
to ecstasy.

SOURCE: “Sara Paretsky: By the Book,” New York Times (Sept. 11, 2014).

IMAGE: Erasure poem from page in New York Times (Sept. 11, 2014) featuring interview with mystery author Sara Paretsky.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Susan Beem is a retired family physician who lives in Long Beach, California, and has been writing poetry for about 10 years with the help of local workshops. Her poems have been published by Verdad, Ekphrasis, Turtle Quarterly, Song of the San Joaquin, Bank Heavy Press, Medusa’s Laugh, and included in several themed anthologies.

NOTE FROM THE AUTHOR: I’m an ardent Radiohead fan, and a few years ago, I saw an interview with Thom Yorke on YouTube. He was dismissive of stupid questions, ferociously intelligent, and gave nothing away. Like his music, he made demands. The Interview magazine interview finds him in a more giving vein, and I wanted to see what I could do with it.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Sarah Nichols is a writer and artist living in Connecticut. Her chapbook, The Country of No, was published in 2012, and her poem “The Mirror” appeared in the Silver Birch Press Noir Erasure Poetry Anthology (December 2013). Her work has also appeared in Found Poetry Review, Right Hand Pointing, and MiPoesias.

NOTE FROM THE AUTHOR: I’ve always been a huge admirer of the late, great Freddie Mercury. In this poem, I’ve allowed his own words to encapsulate my perception of him – a wonderful performer and a truly great free spirit.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Sue Barnard is a novelist, an award-winning poet, and a member of the editorial team of Crooked Cat Publishing. She has a mind which is sufficiently warped as to be capable of compiling questions for BBC Radio 4’s fiendishly difficult Round Britain Quiz – an attribute which once caused one of her sons to describe her as “professionally weird.” She lives in Cheshire, UK, with her husband and a large collection of unfinished scribblings.To learn more, visit her blog.

SOURCE: Benedict Cumberbatch interview, “I went to public school, but I’m not a public school boy,” The Big Issue (Jan 14, 2014).

IMAGE: Actor Benedict Cumberbatch.

NOTE FROM THE AUTHOR: Like most middle-aged women, I have a thing for Benedict Cumberbatch. I pretend that I’m interested in his films and his acting, but really, there is only one thing worth knowing: Will there be romance?

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Marija Smits is a mother-of-two, a writer and poetess whose work has featured in a variety of publications. When she’s not busy with her children, or writing, she likes to draw and paint. Very late at night, when everyone else is asleep, she runs the small press Mother’s Milk Books. Her work is rather eclectic and she loves semicolons, as well as plenty of cream in her coffee. She lives in the middle of England but would like to be a bit closer to the sea. To see more of her writing and art, please visit www.marijasmits.wordpress.com.

NOTE FROM THE AUTHOR: I found this interview to a celebrity from the past, James Joyce, by mere chance. Though not one of my favourite authors, Joyce has played an important role in my life, accompanying and inspiring me on several occasions. His answers in this interview, published around the publication, on his 40th birthday, of his masterpiece Ulysses, were poetic per se, so I just selected and reordered his words to produce this sketchy self-portrait of the writer.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:Massimo Soranzio writes on the northern Adriatic coast of Italy, about 20 miles from Trieste. He teaches English as a foreign language and English literature in a high school, and has been a journalist, a translator, and a freelance lecturer on Modernist literature and literary translation. He posts some of his found and constraint-based poetry on his blog, massimosoranzio.tumblr.com.

I don’t know, Gustavo
I start with blank paper
I’ve tried
never
to fit a thesis or a plan

why in hell do you want to know
what should be true
they say that when you’re in your forties
you ought to know enough and have enough

do you suppose
what knowledge you have
to have or have not
whether you get it or I get it
is a hell of a lot of difference

Sorry, Gustavo
has to ask these questions
it’s his job
and I’m supposed to answer them

so
start work
break the back of the job
put the words in
like laying bricks
work
at it solid
if you speed too much you don’t know
some days a lot, some days a little
getting it all down and then going over it
to straighten things out, to get information

the fight
will have to be fought again
don’t worry
we’ll still have a wonderful time tomorrow

SOURCE: “Ernest Hemingway Talks of Word and War” by Robert Van Gelder, New York Times (August 11, 1940).

NOTE FROM INTERVIEWER: The talk was a mixture of Spanish, French, and English. Each comment that Hemingway made on his writing he prefaced with an explanatory speech to Gustavo Duran, the former pianist and composer, who had developed as one of the most brilliant of the army corps commanders on the Loyalist side of the civil war in Spain.

IMAGE: Ernest Hemingway posing for a dust jacket photo by Lloyd Arnold for the first edition of For Whom the Bell Tolls, Sun Valley Lodge, Idaho, late 1939.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Steve Bogdaniec is a Chicago-based writer and teacher, currently teaching at Wright College in Chicago. Steve will write just about anything: he has had poetry and short fiction published in numerous journals, and recently wrote a monthly movie feature covering movie sequels. Follow him on Twitter! Just kidding—he never posts anything there anyway.